


Burning the Midnight Oil

by WildwingSuz



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-13
Updated: 2015-04-13
Packaged: 2018-03-22 17:14:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3737050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WildwingSuz/pseuds/WildwingSuz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An officer in a case they helped solve is interested in Scully, and she reciprocates much to Mulder’s annoyance—and shock.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burning the Midnight Oil

**Author's Note:**

> This is one that I started way back in '08 and worked on here and there over the years, and desperately wanted to finish. So it took me eight years, at least I did it.
> 
> Spoilers: None. Takes place right about the time of “X-Cops”. 
> 
> Thanks SO MUCH to Marissa P. and Gillyann C. for the fantastic betas, I really appreciate your help and advice.

Burning the Midnight Oil  
Rated NC-17  
By Suzanne Feld

 

“Oh my God, who is that?”

“Agent Mulder’s partner, Dana Scully. Quite the looker, isn’t she?”

“Christ, she’s gorgeous. Wish we’d get cops that looked more like her around here.”

“Tell me about it.” Both detectives sighed and then fell silent as the clacking of those familiar high heels on linoleum drew closer.

Normally hearing other men talking about my partner would have had me doing a slow burn, but the reverence in their voices negated the usual annoyance. They were welcome to admire her as long as they did it respectfully.

I glanced up after a few moments to see the aforementioned redheaded agent heading towards me between the hulking grey metal bullpen desks, a thick case file in one hand and a slight frown on her face. Today she was wearing a dark suit, as she’d begun doing lately, with her usual rather clunky high heels that clicked on the worn linoleum floor. Though the white silk t-shirt beneath her blazer had a neckline that was was fairly high, the jacket only had one button fastened near her waist and it was easy to see that the shirt was tight and outlined her breasts nicely… though it would be even better if that button would just kindly come loose. She was wearing slacks, to my disappointment, but I knew what the legs beneath looked like and ha-ha, the other guys didn’t.

“Mulder, some of the photos are missing from… oh, you have them,” she said as she arrived at the back of the room and saw what was on the desk I was working at. I looked past her and smiled pleasantly at the two detectives who were now staring back at me, having not realized that I was behind them when they discussed my partner. “Are you done with those? I could really use them for comparisons.”

“Sure, help yourself,” I said, scooping them together and handing them to her. Shaking her head, she slid them into the folder, and then walked away without another word, heading back the way she’d come with her nose in the case file, and disappeared around a corner.

I got up and followed her for a short distance, stopping at the unoccupied desk across the aisle from the two detectives, Martinez and Smith. Leaning back on the grey metal and bracing my hands behind me, I smiled at them. “She is gorgeous, isn’t she?” I said in a conversational tone as soon as I was sure that she was out of earshot. “But if you attempt to treat her as anything less than the professional she is I’m going to enjoy watching the fireworks.”

“I don’t know how the hell you work with her day in and day out,” Smith said, shaking his head. He’d been out of the office when I’d picked Scully up from the train station earlier today and hadn’t met her yet, although I had to admit that the other three cops on the task force had had a similar response to her. “Carina’s nice enough to look at, but nothing like that.”

“Not to mention that she’s not interested in us since we had the bad grace to be born with testículos,” Martinez said, smiling, in his faint Hispanic accent. “I do wish she’d find another girlfriend, though, she’s been a royal bruja since she broke up with the last one.”

It was my turn to shake my head as they talked, discussing one of the other detectives on this case. We were on loan to the Boston PD after a rather horrible necrophiliac had decided to base his operations within the city, leaving young women’s corpses naked and recently assaulted in various locations around the area. The latest victim, nineteen-year-old Sunny Evans, had been found on a bench in a freeway rest stop, naked and sprawled with open legs. She was still warm, maybe half an hour deceased when she was found. It truly creeped us all out that cars full of families with children could have seen her, but luckily a group of bikers had spotted and reported her just after dawn.

The only mixed blessing about this case was that the bastard raped the corpses after killing them with a single shot to the head from behind, and it was likely that they never had a clue what hit them. We knew he was using a 9mm with a suppressor from the evidence left behind, but other than that the women had yielded no clues whatsoever; they were carefully washed and the rapist wore gloves and a condom. He’d left them in a variety of public areas during the night and most had been found near or after dawn, with the killer long gone except for one exception that had netted us no real leads.

We had been called in because there was an old X-File from the 1960s with a similar M.O., although once I had gotten here last night via the redeye shuttle and looked over the evidence for myself I’d realized that they were in no way related. Regardless, we were staying to help and would be here until the case was resolved one way or another, with Skinner’s blessing. I assumed he was glad to have us out of his hair on a real case for once.

The main thing we couldn’t figure out was how the victims were chosen. They were from three different ethnic groups, hadn’t lived near each other, only the ages near the same—eighteen to twenty-five. For now we had to assume he had an agenda we couldn’t figure out or was choosing them by opportunity rather than an ideal.

I zoned back into the conversation to find out that it had moved on to the Patriots’ chances this year. Since I’m not interested in football that much, I wandered back to the task force area setup at the back of the room, which was cordoned off by two large freestanding blackboards, a corkboard, and an easel with a big pad of unmarked white paper on it surrounded by crumpled balls of paper. Beyond were two old, battered grey metal desks and a scattering of hard-backed chairs, many of them sprinkled with leftover takeout bags and trays, paper cups, and crumpled sheets of paper. We were sharing Scully’s laptop on this case, but she had it in the interrogation room where she’d gone for privacy so at the moment I didn’t have much to do.

“The problem is that even before these women are reported as missing, they’re dead,” a husky female voice said nearby, getting louder as it came closer. 

“Grabs them, kills them, fucks them, dumps them, and bolts,” a man replied with clear disgust and as I looked up, the other partner pair came between the easel and a blackboard. It was Herb Johnson and the aforementioned Carina Gordon, partners for the last six years—almost as long as Scully and I had been together. Herb was in his early fifties, thirty years married with a wife and teenage daughter that he doted on, and Carina an open and unapologetic lesbian who was one of the guys. I liked all four of the cops we were working with, though Smith was a bit of a dim bulb at times and Carina could be bristly if she thought she was being discriminated against because of her sexual orientation. The six of us were tasked with stopping this bastard before he grabbed another young woman on the way home from the gym or coming out of the grocery store or stopping for coffee on the way to work or, for God’s sake, out walking her dog in broad daylight. 

“Hey, Agent Mulder,” Carina said with easy camaraderie as they each plopped into a chair across from me, Herb pushing a crumpled sheet of paper to the floor. “Any leads? Ideas? Anything?”

“Hell no,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “Scully’s going over the scene photos again but I’m not sure what good it’s going to do.”

We all turned to look at the corkboard, where copies of the file photos were tacked. At the top of each row was a photo of the victims while alive, below a series of photos of the body when found. There had been a single witness to the first attack, well, necrophiliac rape, but the man had been a dockworker who thought he was seeing an amorous couple having sex on a riverside bench. He’d yelled, “Get a room” and when the man got up and ran but the woman just lay there, he’d found the first victim. 

We had a rough police artist’s sketch of the man that the dockworker had seen tacked above the photos of the four victims, but it didn’t have enough detail to really go on. We knew it was a Caucasian or light-skinned Hispanic with shoulder-length dark hair and a large nose, tall and thin, and that was about it.

“How about you?” I asked.

“Nada,” Johnson sighed, resting one ankle over the opposite knee, the generic guy pose. Next to him, Carina sat spraddle-legged with elbows on knees, cupping her face in her hands and gazing at the board with a slight frown. They had been canvassing for witnesses to the third murder again, where the vic had been left on a park bench facing a large avenue. “We tried every house and apartment building that had a window facing the park bench, but no one saw anything. Of fucking course.”

“It was about five a.m., still dark,” Carina pointed out. Then she heaved a sigh. “What’s making me crazy is the lack of a connection between the victims. Usually by the third we know what he’s going after, but it could be anything at this point. Their only connection is that they were all female and lived within ten miles of downtown.”

“Where’s your partner?” Johnson asked me as I sat down in one of the folding chairs across from him. “Taking a break?”

“Scully? No, like all of us she’ll burn the midnight oil until we catch the bastard. She needed a quiet place to think and took our copy of the files into one of the interrogation rooms to be alone with them.”

Martinez and Smith came over, plopping down in the other chairs, leaving only the one behind the desk empty. We all sat and stared at the board in a frustrated silence, one that only cops who’ve hit a brick wall know. As far as we could tell we’d explored every avenue and—

“Mulder! Did you notice that all of these women have short hair?” Scully came barreling down the aisle between the desks towards us, causing everyone in the large room to look up at the overly loud sound of her voice. She lowered it and added, “What if they all had it cut recently?”

“So?” Carina said, looking up listlessly. “You and I have short hair too, what’s that got to do with it?”

“Ah, but we don’t live in the same area,” Scully pointed out, stopping to stand beside my chair, putting one hand on its back. I looked up at her to see that her face was flushed and I had the passing thought that she’d never looked more beautiful. “Isn’t it possible that these women could share the same hairdresser? Maybe they went to visit him right before their deaths and that’s how the killer picked them, he could live or work nearby. It could be the link we’re looking for, and I certainly hope it is because I can’t find any other way that they could be connected.”

“It’s worth a shot,” Johnson shrugged, getting up. “We can start by looking at all the salons in the area and then showing our incredibly descriptive suspect picture around.”

“Nah, me and Smith’ll look up the businesses,” Martinez said with a glance at his partner, who nodded. “Take a load off. You two were out all morning.”

“Thanks, man,” Carina said, smiling over at her co-worker. “I’ll go grab us some coffee, at least. Anybody want to help?”

“I will,” I volunteered, standing, but Scully beat me to it.

“Mulder, I know that you were up half the night studying the files so you stay put too. Just don’t expect us women to get the coffee every time.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I told her receding back truthfully as they headed for the break room. I had arrived late last night though Scully had been working on something for Skinner and hadn’t made it until earlier today. Little did she know I hadn’t gotten any sleep; I’d checked into the motel, gotten us both rooms and sat in mine just long enough to read over the files and familiarize myself with the case, and then came here and here I’d been ever since.

I turned to the map of Boston that was tacked to the corkboard, walking over to study it. There were red pushpins that denoted where the bodies were found, blue ones showing where they were murdered/abducted, while white ones showed the victims’ homes. Though the red and blue pins showed no discernable pattern I did note that the white ones were in a large skewed square. 

Johnson came up next to me and I pointed to the pins. “I’m sure that Scully’s on to something, and if not the hairdresser maybe it’s a specialty store or coffeeshop or someplace similar,” I said, circling my finger around them. “They all lived within eight miles of each other.”

“A small area in the larger scheme of things, and there have to be dozens of businesses that they could have all frequented,” he pointed out. “But I agree, it’s worth a shot. At least it gives us a place to start showing the picture around.”

It took us a couple of hours but finally we came up with a list of six hair and three nail salons that were within the square or close driving distance of the four white pins. It was simple enough for each of us to take three and head on out to the streets even though it was nearly four o’clock and getting close to the end of the workday. 

We struck out at the first two but on the third, the manager of the salon frowned over our picture. “That kinda looks like Danny Cochran, our newest stylist,” she said, and then waved it over at one of the other hairdressers nearby. “Hey, do you think this could be Danny?”

The stylist left her customer with head in sink and came over to where the three of us were standing by the front desk and I showed her the picture, which she took with a frown. “Maybe, with a wider jaw and smaller eyes,” she said doubtfully, and then handed the picture back to me. “What’d he do?”

“Is he here now?” Scully asked, looking at the manager without answering the woman’s question.

The hairdresser shrugged and went back to her customer, who had lifted her dripping head out of the white porcelain sink and was looking over at us with clear annoyance as the manager answered, “No, he’s off until tomorrow afternoon, he comes in at one.” 

“Can we get his home address?” I asked, folding the picture and tucking it away in my inside jacket pocket. “We’re questioning all men in this area who match his description and it could be important.”

“He only lives a couple of blocks from here, right behind the Revere Party Store over on Mitchell Street. I know because he’s always complaining that the noise in the parking lot keeps him up at night. But hang on a sec, I’ll get you his address.”

While the manager went into the back room I turned to Scully. “I’m going to step out and call the others. I’ve got a feeling we could use some backup on this one.”

She looked up and gave me one of her rare full-fledged grins. God, she was stunning when she did that and I felt my heart jolt. “Either you’re getting old, Mulder, or I’m rubbing off on you,” she said, bright blue eyes sparkling. “Since when have you ever waited for backup?”

A little stung by the ‘old’ comment I nonetheless grinned back, enjoying her smile and playfulness, which I saw far too rarely. “You haven’t rubbed off on me yet,” I said in a low voice with a knowing look, which made her huff but not lose the smile. I certainly wasn’t so old that I couldn’t throw some innuendo her way. “But since we’re all in the same area we won’t have to wait too long for them to get there. I’m going to have them park near his house and then you and I can go question him.”

I went outside to call the other two teams on my cellular, and no sooner had I hung up than Scully came out of the salon holding a small sheet of pink notepaper with the suspect’s address on it. “They’re on the way,” I told her, pulling the car keys from my pocket as we walked over to the tan pool Ford parked a half-block or so away. “Let’s do this.”

Only a few minutes later we stopped three houses up from the suspect’s tiny bungalow, which was just on the other side of a white-painted cinderblock fence from the parking lot of a large party store that appeared to specialize in the cheapest booze this side of the Canadian border if the garish advertising on its building was to be believed. Parked in front of his house was a black Chevy Silverado full-sized pickup with a matching shell on the bed, and I pointed it out to Scully as I turned off the engine. “Hey, think that’s big enough to transport a body?”

“Easily,” she agreed. “And the cap’s windows are tinted, so he wouldn’t have to worry about anyone seeing in while he was driving around.”

We sat in silence for a time, listening to the tick of the car engine cooling. “How long will it take the others to get here?” Scully asked, drumming her neatly manicured fingernails on the edge of the door just below the closed passenger window.

“Carina said about five minutes, Smith and Martinez are further away,” I replied and then sat up, holding onto the steering wheel and leaning forward, as the front door of the house we were monitoring opened. “Oh, shit.”

“Dammit,” Scully swore at the same moment. We looked at each other, and then back at the porch as a tall, thin, dark-haired man stepped out and paused to lock the deadbolt with a key. Without speaking, we got out of the car and headed down the walk together.

“Mr. Cochran? Daniel Cochran?” I called as he descended the two shallow steps from the postage-stamp-sized cement porch to the walk.

He turned towards us, his eyes widening and then narrowing, face going pale. I knew he was going to rabbit a split second before he moved, and Scully and I took off after him together. I threw her the keys so she could get the car, which she often did when I was in foot pursuit of a suspect. Between my long legs and her high heels, she usually didn’t try to keep up with me though she could run pretty fast on her own.

Cochran raced straight past the party store and darted across a four-lane main street without looking and made it across, but I saw traffic coming both ways and slowed, as I knew I couldn’t get through without a good chance of getting hit. All of the cars managed to stop at my waving them down and I ran across but I was now a good half-block behind Cochran. As I pushed myself to run faster, a dark sedan zipped past me with red and blue police lights flashing in the back window and slewed to a skidding stop half up on the sidewalk just beyond the suspect. Carina and Herb leapt out and before Cochran could even reverse direction, the female detective had tackled him. By the time I reached them he was cuffed and being read his rights. Moments later Scully drove up, parking behind the plainclothes car in our rental sedan and hurrying over to us, but the other two had the situation well in hand. Though we weren’t sure yet, we all had a pretty good idea that we had just collared the murdering bastard we’d been searching for. I was really proud that Scully had broken the case and joined in when the detectives thanked her for it.

Four hours later we were done at the police station, Cochran booked for the murders of the four young women. We’d had no problem getting a warrant to search his house and truck, where we’d found enough incriminating evidence to keep him locked up for a good long time—but, thank God, no more bodies. After doing our prelim paperwork for the Boston PD we got ready to leave; it was too late to fly back to DC tonight but, I thought, maybe after dinner we could sit and watch a movie in one of our rooms or something if Scully wasn’t too tired.

One of the things I really enjoyed about being out of town on cases was the companionship. Though I often wanted to see Scully when we were in town, I could rarely come up with an excuse that didn’t involve work, which usually irritated her. But on the road we usually didn’t know anyone else and so ended spending off-work time together, like now. Maybe if we were lucky, I thought, another Godzilla movie would be playing like the one that had kept me company last night as I studied case files in the usual cheap hotel room.

I hefted the laptop case to my shoulder and turned to Scully to ask if she was ready, but at that moment Martinez came over. “Agent Scully, could I speak to you for a moment in private?” he said, glancing at me meaningfully.

“I’ll wait in the car,” I said, and then glanced back as I headed for the door; we’d already said our goodbyes and I wondered what the detective wanted. She was nodding at whatever he was saying, and then set her briefcase on a nearby desk and popped it open. Maybe she’d forgotten to return some of the case files; they had gotten a bit scattered from being passed around, I thought. I then put it out of my mind as I wondered if Scully would want Chinese or Greek for dinner as I’d noticed both types of restaurant near the station earlier, though I was partial to saganaki so I’d suggest that first.

When she got in the passenger side of the car I noticed that she was a little flushed, but thought nothing of it at first. “So, Scully, I noticed that there’s a Greek place on the way—“

“Uh, sorry, Mulder,” she interrupted me as she fastened her seat belt, “I’m having dinner with Iván tonight.” I looked at her blankly. “Detective Martinez,” she added, glancing at me before looking away again, the flush across her cheeks deepening. “He’s picking me up in an hour.”

I was totally nonplussed and started the car without replying. Scully? Dinner with someone else? And I wasn’t invited? Just what the fuck was I supposed to do all evening by myself? I began to smolder with anger that she could make plans without me, but also knew that she owed me nothing; she was a legal adult and free to go out with whomever she pleased. I simply had not, for years, thought that she would want to go out with anyone other than me.

The motel was only a half-mile or so from the police station but by the time we got there I was furious but manfully trying to hide it. I needed to think this over before I did or said anything we would both probably regret later. The Padgett fiasco came to mind first and foremost.

Without a word to her I got out of the car, just barely managing not to slam the door. But before I got more than a step or two away I heard her voice behind me. “Mulder?”

I turned back, clenching my jaw. “What, Scully?”

“My room key?” she walked towards me, then frowned slightly as she got closer. “You all right?”

“Yeah, just tired, I was up all night,” I said shortly as I dug in the pockets of my suit jacket until I found both card-keys and handed hers over. 

“Get some rest, I’ll call tonight and get us a flight in the morning,” she said, looking up at me with concern for a moment. Her blush had faded but her eyes skittered away from mine, unable to hold my gaze. If you’re so worried about me, I thought snidely, then why are you going out with someone else? “I’ll see you then.”

“Yeah,” I said shortly, turning away and unlocking my door. Once inside, I managed not to slam it but tore off my suit jacket angrily, throwing it in the general direction of the bed, and kicked my shoes off without caring where they went. I couldn’t fucking believe this. I had thought... never mind what I thought, Scully obviously didn’t. Moving automatically I stripped down to my underwear and t-shirt, tossing clothes everywhere even more carelessly than I usually did. I found myself pacing back and forth and plopped on the edge of the neatly made bed that I hadn’t used yet, afraid she’d hear me. We didn’t have connecting rooms even though hers was next door but, I thought, I could probably see them when Martinez came to pick her up. I was curious as to how she’d dress since I doubted that she brought date-worthy clothes on a road trip.

I went over to the small round table by the door and moved everything around so that I could sit in one of the hard wooden chairs and peer out of a chink in the curtains towards her room. Though I was still hungry, I wasn’t able to eat now and listened to my stomach grumble as I waited. I was still aghast that Scully could do this to me; I hadn’t seriously thought about going out with anyone else in years. Other than that sad vampire chick in California I hadn’t seen a woman romantically other than a few dates with a French flight attendant I’d met at Dulles back in ’95. When I’d stood her up several times due to work she’d left a nasty message on my answering machine and that had been the end of that.

I had, I realized, been saving myself for Scully. Without really thinking about it I had always assumed that someday we’d be together as more than partners; it wasn’t possible now, of course, but once the work was done... if it ever was. I frowned, wondering if we would ever be done with the X-Files; no matter how many times they were closed or questioned, we always got them back. Would we be sixty years old before we finally became a real couple?

That wasn’t going to work. Though I had myriad reasons for not wanting to start a romantic relationship with Scully right now, this was really making me think twice. It had never occurred to me since the reinstatement of the X-Files after Antarctica that she might be interested in someone else. I still remembered the night she’d come into my room and found Detective White on top of me; the look on her face had told me everything I thought I’d needed to know despite the incidents with Padgett and Jerse. Those episodes, I knew, had been a mistake of monumental proportions on both our parts and I hadn’t thought she’d do it again.

My eyes sharpened as a deep midnight blue late-model Mustang pulled into the parking slot next to our dull tan Lariat rental sedan. Martinez got out, dressed in pressed khakis, a dark brown blazer, and striped button-down shirt tans tie. He cleaned up nice, I had to grudgingly admit. He disappeared from my sight but reappeared just moments later with Scully, stepping ahead and holding the Mustang’s door open for her. I felt my jaw drop; where did Scully get those clothes, I wondered. I knew she hadn’t left the motel to go buy them, and I was surprised that she carried something like that with her. Then, as I looked closer, I realized that she was wearing the skirt from one of her dark blue suits except that it was quite a bit shorter, with a low-cut lacy black top beneath an unbuttoned, silky blue button-down shirt that was tucked into the skirt. I also recognized the blouse and realized that she’d altered her existing work clothes—she was nothing if not ingenious, that was for sure. It was September and while warm enough to go without a heavy coat, I snidely thought that she was dressed a bit lightly for the weather.

No sooner had the Mustang begun to back out than I was yanking on my pants and casting around for my shirt. Though I hadn’t planned to follow them, well, I needed to eat too, now didn’t I? I knew better but since when had I ever followed a rational course?

* * *

Forty minutes later I was bored out of my head and ready to head back to the motel; wiretaps of criminals watching strippers were more interesting than this. Martinez had taken Scully to a nice Italian restaurant on the outskirts of town and though I had at first planned to dine there as well, I later decided that it wasn’t a very good idea. Instead I watched them go in and then drove to a 7-Eleven nearby, grabbed a coffee and cold sandwich, and had been sitting in the parking lot of the restaurant ever since. What was I waiting for, I wondered. Was I going to follow them to wherever they went when they left? What if they went to his place? Was I going to break down the door like a second-rate Hulk and demand that he unhand my work partner?

Okay, enough, I told myself, pulling my seat upright and starting the car. This was pathetic, and I didn’t need more of that in my wretched life. On the way back I stopped at a liquor store and bought myself a six-pack of Michelob; though I rarely drank I had the feeling I’d need it tonight, especially if Scully didn’t come back for a few hours—or even until morning. 

But it was no more than an hour after I returned to my room and had gotten comfortable that I heard car doors slamming outside and hurried over to the window to peer through the crack in the curtains. As I watched Martinez walked back to his car alone and then drove off. From the next room I heard the door close, then silence.

Well. At least she had come back alone, and certainly hadn’t been gone long enough to do anything that I wouldn’t approve of, I thought with some amusement, my mood lightening. I sometimes wondered about her, why she didn’t date and if her being attracted to the kind of man like Ed Jerse was why. If that was the case, then why did she go out with Martinez, who seemed like a pretty regular guy? I was sure she’d been asked out before by other cops on cases we’d helped with so why him? And if him, why was she back so early?

Now that she was home safely I felt exhaustion catching up with me; I rarely got more than three or four hours of sleep a night so staying up for over twenty-four hours wasn’t much of a stretch for me, but it did get to me eventually. I may as well sack out, I thought, going back to the bed and picking up the remote. I’d drunk two beers and while I didn’t feel buzzed I figured that it would help me sleep; I opened a third and chugged part of it, setting it on the nightstand. Then I turned off the lights and settled down comfortably under the covers to watch some tube until I dozed off.

I hadn’t even decided on what to watch yet before a low rap came from my door. My heart leaped, and although I couldn’t help but assume that something might be wrong, I knew that it was Scully and that was all that mattered. I jumped up, turning on the bedside lamp, and hurried over to the door, opening it to find her standing there wrapped in a white terrycloth robe, dark silky pajama pants and a pair of scuffed tan slippers below it. “Scully—anything wrong?” 

She let her gaze roam down me, then gave me a close-mouthed smile. “Only that you’re answering the door nearly naked,” she said, and I realized that I was wearing just my boxer-briefs. Though I had no problem with nudity and Scully had seen me in less than this many times before, it probably wouldn’t be good if someone else, say Martinez, saw us right now. “Not that I mind all that much...”

What had she said? Had I heard her correctly? I decided that I hadn’t; perhaps the beer did have me a little more drunk than I’d thought. “C’mon in,” I said, turning away as she stepped in, then closed the door behind herself as I went over to the chair where I’d tossed the rest of my clothes when I’d gotten back. “I was in bed,” I said by way of explanation as I pulled on my suit pants and zipped them, though I didn’t bother with the belt. “Better?”

“Depends on whom you ask,” she said cryptically, gliding past me to perch on the edge of my bed near the foot. “I heard the TV on in here and wanted to see if you were okay. Still can’t sleep?”

I picked up the half-empty bottle from the nightstand and waggled it at her before going to sit at the table with it, as far from her as I could get in the small room. “I was gettin’ there.”

Both brows went up. “What’s wrong? We caught the guy, the case is over.”

Anger swelled in me and I spoke without thinking. “Well, while you were out having a good time, I made do with a sandwich from 7-Eleven. Was a little less fancy than your Italian place.”

Her eyes widened and those red rosebud lips parted, and I realized what I had said. “You followed us, Mulder?” she said incredulously, jumping to her feet with arms akimbo. “Seriously?”

“Uh, no, I saw Martinez pick you up in that Mustang and when I went to the—“

“Right. Don’t bother lying. You asshole, you don’t want me but you don’t want anyone else have me either!” she spat, glaring across the room at me. “I’m really getting sick and fucking tired of waiting.”

Was it my sleep-deprived, alcohol-distorted brain or had she said what I thought I’d heard? “Scully—“

“No, Mulder, you hear me out. Every damn time I go out with or get interested in someone else, you have a problem with it. But when I make a move on you, you run like a scared virgin. What in the hell am I supposed to do, wait until we’re too old to do anything about it before you make your play?”

Hearing her say what I’d been thinking earlier was sobering. “What do you mean, make a move on me? You never have.”

Her eyes narrowed. "Mulder, bear with me here. What do grownups usually intend with a private wine and cheese party? I know you're not stupid, because I see you understand the smallest nuances of human interaction when it comes to our cases. Could you maybe, just this once, consider turning those high beams on your own damn life?"

I felt like I’d been shoved sideways into a different reality, a timeline where nothing was as I knew it. Even more so than usual. I wanted to make a smart remark like “so you’re hot for my body?” but for once I thought twice before I did. “Your subtlety would make you a good spy because I never once figured out what you were up to,” I said with some heat, getting annoyed and feeling a bit clueless. “Besides, I had no idea you saw me that way so I didn’t think to make a move on you. It seemed just the opposite.”

"You were seeing what you wanted to, not what was really going on.” She sank down to perch the edge of the bed again, hands worrying one of the loose ends of the robe’s terrycloth belt. “When are you going to notice that I'm a woman, Mulder?! What do I have to do, walk down the street naked to get you to see me in a romantic light? I've done just about everything but that!"

“So, you’ve been trying to interest me in a romantic, uh, relationship?” I said, still trying to wrap my head around it. I took a drink of beer and thought about offering her one, but her next words made me forget about it.

“I gave up for a time after you walked out on me when I came to your room in Florida, though I thought for a while after the artifact that you’d... well, I’m not one to beat my head against a wall,” she said, her shoulders slumping and standing up to put her hands in the robe’s pockets. “I just never understood why you didn’t date and still weren’t interested in me.”

“Scully, I’m more interested than you could possibly guess,” I told her as I also stood up, thinking she might be leaving and hoping she wouldn’t just yet; as much as I feared this talk, we really did need to have it. Especially after everything that had just been said. “It just... the timing never seemed right, that’s all.”

“The timing will never be right, I’ve known that for years,” she said with a trace of amused asperity, and then her face and voice went serious again. “To be blunt, I’m not interested in anyone but you, Mulder. I’m tired of hiding it and tired of trying to pretend that the attraction’s not there. But if you don’t feel the same way then I’ve got to move on. I don’t want to be alone anymore. It wasn’t so bad when I thought we would eventually be together, but if that’s out of the picture then I’m done.”

It was a sudden moment of clarity, the type of epiphany I rarely had in my life. Jesus, I had never thought that I could be this dense, although dealing with women and romance had never been my strong suit. So Scully had been interested in me for at least four years and I’d never caught it? Now that she’d stated her interest I knew I had a choice, and I had to make my decision fast. If I rejected her here I knew she would never come back to me even if I ever thought we could safely be in a relationship, and who could blame her? 

For the last seven years I’d made excuse after excuse not to be with her, I realized, for a myriad of reasons: my past relationships, the danger of the Syndicate finding out and using us against each other, the FBI separating us and, worst of all, us being unable to make a romantic relationship work like I had in the past and breaking up completely. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing Scully, and working with her had been, up until now, vastly preferable to failing her due to my inability to maintain a romantic relationship.

But were those concerns worth losing her over right here, right now? Could I stand not trying and never knowing?

These thoughts flashed through my head in a matter of seconds and there was no real choice to be made; all roads led to this moment. We were standing just a few feet apart, me between her and the door. I opened my arms and said, low, “C’mere, Scully.”

She gave me one of those beautiful closed-mouth smiles. “No, Mulder, you come here,” she said, amusement in her eyes as she untied her robe and let it fall open to show the dark blue, silky men’s-style pajamas beneath. I got it; after all the chasing she’d been doing, even unbeknownst to me, it was about time I went to her. And so I did.

Two steps covered the distance between us and then she was in my arms. Though this was far from the first time we’d embraced or hugged, it was wholly unlike any of those. For the first time I was cognizant of the press of each of her breasts against my ribs, her taut belly and hipbones touching my upper thighs, how tiny yet strong she was. She reached up and twined her arms around my shoulders, one hand cupping the back of my head and pulling me down to her. She kissed me demandingly, and I felt my head swim in a way that had nothing to do with the booze or sleep deprivation. I knew that Scully was no shrinking violet and went for what she wanted, and apparently sex was no exception. Well, now that we were going for it, I felt no more hesitation on making both of our fantasies come true.

I kissed her in return with everything I’d been holding back and then some. Our first real kiss was almost wild, our tongues meeting and dueling to get in the other’s mouth. Our teeth clinked and noses bumped as we turned our heads back and forth, twisting and rotating to find what worked best. It all did, I decided hazily. 

Apparently Scully didn’t mind the taste of Michelob with the way she was using her tongue to rub my front teeth, and she tasted of toothpaste and mint with undertones of her own sweet scent that I was already addicted to. I kept my eyes just barely cracked open so I could see her, and felt a jolt deep in my belly when I realized that she was peeking back at me the same way. Even just kissing was already more of an arousing, exhilarating experience than I’d ever had with another woman.

Finally we had to pause and gulp for air and I leaned my forehead against hers, panting, finding that I had cupped her head in my hands sometime during the wild kiss and now moved them down to caress her upper arms through the terrycloth robe. “Scully... we don’t have to take this too fast or too far if you don’t want to,” I rasped, not wanting to assume that we’d sleep together tonight simply because she was in my room and kissing me. “Just—“

She moved her head back and we both straightened up so that I was looking down at her though our lower bodies still touched. “Mulder. Seriously. I think we’ve waited long enough,” she said with a look in her eye that caused another jolt deep in my belly and my erection to twitch between us. “Unless you’re trying to get out of this again, my plan is that we’re going to dive into that bed and fuck like crazed bunnies until we pass out.”

I guffawed; I couldn’t help it. She grinned widely in response and the sound and sight of her so happy was deeply moving; I saw her like this far too rarely. I pulled her tight against me with my arms around her shoulders and she put hers around my waist, linking her fingers behind my back as we laughed together briefly. I dropped my forehead to her shoulder and, without thinking, said, “I love you so much, Scully.”

She stiffened against me and for a moment I thought she was going to pull away, but then she melted against me, arms tightening around my waist, and whispered, “I love you too, Mulder, and have for so long.”

The emotional swings between us were dizzying but I loved every moment of it. I stood up straight again and took her face in my hands much like I had done several times before in our past, but this time I wasn’t fighting my attraction to and love for her. “I’ve been a fool,” I said honestly, looking her in the eyes to strengthen my point. “I think I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you, and I’m damn glad you forced me to acknowledge it. We need this, Scully, and we both deserve to be happy, as much as we can.”

Her deep blue eyes softened as they gazed up into mine with the same adoration I felt for her. “We will be,” was all she said before she went up on tiptoe and pulled my mouth to hers again.

I was done with talking; I had gotten fully hard during that incredible first kiss and now I was more than ready to take our relationship to the next level. As our mouths met this time I maneuvered us the short distance over to the bed and, without breaking the kiss, swung us around so that I fell back on it with Scully on top of me. We both squirmed around until we were laying the right way, my head on the pillow and her body pressing on me from chest to toe. I sank both hands into her hair and kissed her with everything I had been keeping suppressed, and she braced her hands on either side of my head on the pillow and kissed me back with enough desire and longing to make me dizzy with arousal.

I let my hands wander, slipping them beneath the robe to unbutton her pajama top as she lifted her chest from mine without breaking the kiss. It caused her taut belly to press down on my cock and I let out an unintentional groan into her mouth at the delicious pressure. Even before I got the last buttons undone I slid my hands inside her top to cup her breasts, both of us moaning into the other’s mouth as I gently kneaded them. Her nipples were already tight little gumdrops, and I rubbed them up and down against the center of my palms as I gently squeezed. She groaned deeply into my mouth and then broke the kiss, lifting herself up as I undid the last couple of buttons so that her chest was over my mouth and then she lowered her right breast to my mouth. I pushed the material back over her slender shoulders and then cupped both breasts as I suckled back and forth, my eyes falling closed in sheer delight. She arched back and let out breathy moans as I licked, nibbled and thoroughly enjoyed her breasts. I loved how uninhibited she was, and couldn’t wait to see what else she was open to.

“Oh my God Mulder are you good at that, it’s just the way I like it,” she breathed from above me, and I opened my eyes with one nipple in my mouth and looked up to see her watching me avidly. “But I want to touch, and taste you, too.”

“And I want you to,” I rasped before giving one tight raspberry nipple a final lick and reluctantly letting go of her as she moved away from my hands. “We need to get rid of these damn clothes.”

She sat up, legs spread over my hips and her center right on my cock, causing us both to groan. I pushed up and she pressed down and I swear I saw stars. Not for the first time was I glad that I took my time when I masturbated; I had never been of the mind to just get it over with and sometimes took as long as an hour before I let myself come. It was standing me in good stead now.

“God fucking damn, I want to taste you now, Mulder,” she said, tearing off her robe and pajama shirt and letting it fall to the bed behind her. I put my hands on her hips over the remaining silky material and enjoyed looking at her for a moment; her breasts weren’t large but they were full and high, the dark pink nipples still tight and puckered with arousal. A rosy flush covered her upper chest, neck, and cheeks and I noticed the light dusting of freckles across her shoulders for the first time. 

“C’mon, we can look to our heart’s content later,” she said rather breathlessly and I realized that she had been studying me as well; I could only hope that she liked what she saw, but it certainly seemed that she did. She rolled off of my body, pushing and kicking her pajama pants off. I did the same but before I could toss them from the bed, I had a redheaded dervish all over me. Our clothes ended up tangled in the jumbled covers as we came together naked for the first time, hands groping and mouths sucking and licking at any bit of skin we could reach. I managed to get both hands on her ass and squeezed the firm globes, pulling her tight against me face-to-face on our sides with my cock trapped hotly between us. But she braced her forearms against my chest and pushed me away gently but firmly, breaking my hold on her. 

Before I could protest she had reached down and encircled my straining cock with one small but strong hand, stroking me up and down so perfectly that I thrust up into her fist helplessly, moaning loudly like I was coming though, luckily, I was nowhere near despite my high arousal. “Fucking Christ, Scully,” I managed to growl as she stroked me again, slow and tight. “You touch me just, uh, just right, too.”

She smiled up at me in answer as she slid down the bed, and I once again saw stars as she sucked me in, her free hand reaching up and caressing my chest, tweaking my nipples and running her fingers through the sparse hair, then moving down to land on my hip. For the first time I felt my arousal rising to a dangerous level; it had been a long time since I’d had a blowjob and it felt so damned good that I was afraid I’d lose control. I knew how to pace myself with a woman but Scully had me so stimulated that I wasn’t sure how long I could control myself without losing my mind. I was quickly realizing that where Scully was concerned all other women paled to a faint and unimportant memory that had nothing to do with what was going on in this bed.

It was my turn to push her away, gently but firmly, with my hands on her delicate shoulders. “This is going to be over before we’ve begun if you keep that up,” I said by way of explanation. “You’re just too damn good at it.”

She smiled at me, looking so damn happy that I took a mental snapshot that I would treasure for the rest of my life. “Another time, then,” she said agreeably, and rolled over on her back. “One day soon I have to suck you off, though, I want to taste you when you come,” she said in a matter-of-fact way that made me shiver. 

“That’s what I’m gonna do right now, to you,” I said huskily, watching her expression go from delighted to deeply aroused. I moved around and she scooted up so that I ended up on elbows and knees between her legs, lowering my mouth to her center with my hands cradling the sides of her hips. I could smell her arousal long before I tasted it, a rich musky scent that caused my excitement to climb even more though I hadn’t thought that possible. My balls were drawn up so tight against my body that it was almost uncomfortable, and that usually only happened right before I ejaculated. I spread her lips apart and then took a long, slow lick up over her vulva, pushing my tongue shallowly into her vagina as I passed it and ending with a swirl around her swollen clit. 

“Oh my fucking God Mulder,” Scully cried, arching her back with arms braced against the solid wood headboard, spreading her legs even wider. “That’s, oh, God, ah, incredible!”

I really went to work then, listening to find out what she responded to best. I had always enjoyed going down on a woman and Scully responded with moans and cries and movements and almost-intelligible words that made it pretty easy for me to figure out how to do her right. I was so into it that it took me a moment to respond when I felt her tugging on my hair. “Mulder—Mulder, stop. I want to come with you inside me,” she was saying.

I lifted my head and looked up at her lust-suffused face, using a corner of the bedspread to unobtrusively wipe my face that was half-covered with her juices. “What?”

She gave me a beautiful smile, the color high in her cheeks, lips swollen and red from our mad kisses. “I want to come with you inside me,” she repeated patiently urging me up onto her body. “God knows it won’t take much after this, I’m almost there now.”

But before I could get into position between her legs she put her hands on my chest and stopped me again. “I want a position where I can see you going in me; I have dreamed of his for so many years I’m not going to let it go by without watching,” she demanded. “Besides, you have got the most delectable cock and I want to see more of it.”

Another shiver chased through me; I found her open and direct talking in bed to be deeply sexual and highly arousing. Whatever she wanted; as long as I got inside her soon it was all fine by me. “What’s good for you?” I asked, running my hands from her shoulders all the way down to her hips, feeling her curves and contours, her skin softer than silk. She was slender, and yet luxuriantly rounded and sensuous. 

“Like this.” She grabbed a pillow from the top of the bed and swung it around, bracing her feet on the bed and lifting her hips. I helped tuck it beneath her ass, and saw that she was almost level with my cock. As I moved into position she grabbed the other pillow and folded it under her head, raising it so she could see, then flipped her legs over my biceps so her ass was raised in the air when I leaned forward. “Now, Mulder!”

God knew I needed no further urging. I lined up and then tested the waters with one finger; she was so wet and swollen with arousal that it was like dipping into a pool of hot oil. I took her by the hips and began to push in, looking down at her beautiful body spread out before me, her hands braced against the headboard. I could only groan her name as I entered her, her body tight but not unable to take my size. I’d had problems with some women but despite how small she was physically and being nearly bent in half, Scully took me in with no difficulty, her eyes glued to it as my thick, veined cock slid into her. I watched as well, though I kept glancing up at her face, finding that her aroused expression fired me even more.

“Oh, God, Muldeeerrrr,” she groaned, raising her eyes to mine as she lifted her arms again and braced them against the headboard. My heart jumped at the look on her face; between that and the sensation of her body welcoming and wrapping me in deep tight warmth I nearly lost it. I held still for a moment, getting ahold of myself, and when I thought it safe I pulled out and thrust back in, trying not to be too rough but so on the edge I wasn’t sure if I was or not. Judging by Scully’s sensual cry it was a good idea, and I did it again, then again and again, moving faster with each stroke. I couldn’t have stopped at this point if she’d put a gun to my head, not with Scully moaning and writhing beneath me, watching me with half-closed eyes and her cheeks and chest flushed with arousal, breasts bouncing in time to my thrusts. The bed was squeaking and our bodies slapping together with loud wet thwaps were music with the sound of our cries and panting.

I managed to keep my head just enough to wonder if she’d be able to come like this, because there was no way I would go off without her joining me and damn was I close. But just as I thought it, she brought one arm down and with no shyness or hesitation whatsoever, began to rub her clit with one long, slender finger. “Jesus, Scully, that is so hot,” I managed to gasp as I sped up even more, eyes glued to what she was doing. I’d never before been to bed with a woman who was so openly and confidently sexual, and it was firing me to heights I’d never even thought possible.

Then she threw her head back with a hoarse, choked yell and her entire body began to buck against me. Even though I was still thrusting fierce and fast into her, I felt her inner muscles contract and pulse around me, which was so intense that I let go without control, pounding into her with a bellow of her name that I couldn’t hold back. It felt like I came forever, both contractions and ejaculation going on and on. Knowing what a contorted position she was in I managed to keep a modicum of control and as I came down from the overwhelming orgasm, managed to rear back on my knees to let her legs down before I collapsed on her with my elbows holding most of my weight. 

We panted together for a while, my head resting lightly on her heaving chest, her hands tangled loosely in my sweat-dampened hair. My back began to ache uncomfortably from being bent over her with a pillow beneath her ass, and as much as I didn’t want to move I had to go up on my knees again with a low groan and then moved to her side, where I collapsed beside her, throwing one arm across her slender waist. 

And that was all I ever remembered of that night.

* * *

When I woke the next morning, the room was bright with early sunlight and I felt good, more relaxed and contented, than I had in years. It took a few moments for the events of the previous night to hit me and when they did I bolted upright, looking around. The other side of the double bed was empty, though the pillow had a head-sized dent in it and the covers were thrown back. I noticed right away that most of our clothes appeared to be still tangled among the sheets and blanket. Had Scully left me? Had it been worse than I’d thought, or was she angry that I had, apparently, passed out immediately afterward?

“Hey, you’re finally awake.”

I looked over to see my partner coming out of the bathroom toweling her hair with a white motel towel and wrapped in the same robe she’d worn the night before but sans pajamas. I couldn’t see her face due to the towel and I was immediately worried that something was wrong. “Scully—“ I rasped, then cleared my throat.

“No worries, Mulder. Yes, you did pass out on me afterwards but considering you’d been up well over twenty-four hours by the time we had that vigorous and inspired sex, I quite understand. You’ll just have to give me a free pass in case I ever pull that on you.”

While talking she had come over to the bed, tossing the towel on one of the chairs by the window and running her fingers through her hair to settle the dark auburn strands, and then sat down by my side. I reached out to gather her to me, thinking that it felt both odd and right to be able to do so now. She snuggled against my chest with her arms around my waist, pressing a kiss to my bare shoulder before settling her cheek against it. Her hair was damp and smelled like citrus-y shampoo, and I nuzzled it as I murmured, “You have a free pass for anything you want ever again, Scully, after last night.”

I felt her cheek moving into a smile as I settled my arms around her shoulders. “I don’t know if you have to go quite that far, but I know what you mean. It was great, wasn’t it?”

I gently nudged her back so that she was sitting up again and took one of her hands, sliding it beneath the covers and onto the huge erection I was sporting now that I was sure everything was all right. “Wanna try again and make sure that we remember it correctly?”

With a hearty laugh she stood up and dropped the robe, her freshly showered, curvaceous body gleaming like a newly opened pearl in the bright but diffused morning light filtering through the closed curtains. “Well, we scientists do like to repeat our experiments to make sure we get the same results every time,” she said drolly as she tossed the covers aside and climbed onto me. “Something tells me that it’s going to require a lot more tests before I can definitively report the results of this one.”

We came together smiling.

 

finis


End file.
